Touch screens are used in many portable electronic devices, for instance in PDA (Personal Digital Assistant) devices, tabletops, and mobile devices. Touch screens are operable by a pointing device (or stylus) and/or by a finger. Typically the devices also comprise conventional buttons for certain operations.
Lately, so-called hovering user interfaces have been proposed for devices with touch screens. Hovering refers generally to inputs by an object, such as a finger, in close proximity to a user interface input surface, but not touching the input surface. Thus, also the space above a touch screen surface may be used as further means for user inputs. For instance, the user interface can be arranged to react to finger hovering by popping up a menu. The desired item on the menu may then be selected touching the screen. People who are using mobile devices generally wish to have more versatile and intuitive ways to interact with their devices.